A mum is “disgusted” after a supermarket sold alcohol to her 12-year-old daughter and nine-year-old son even though they were wearing school uniform.So disgusted, she rang the store.
And then rang the newspaper to get a picture of her looking disgusted.
Donna Brannigan’s daughter Skye and son Phoenix went into Asda in London Road, Swanley to buy their mother a surprise birthday present.Oh, wow! She’s mother of the year, isn’t she?
When 33-year-old Ms Brannigan opened the wrapping paper she was outraged to discover her children had managed to buy her a box of four chocolate hearts containing a small bottle of champagne.
No, ‘Oh, thank you darlings, how lovely!’ Just outrage…
The mother-of-four added: “How many other children may have managed to do this? I'm disgusted.But obviously they aren’t, so why all the fuss?
“They innocently bought a present for their mum. When I opened it my son looked at me blankly and said he didn’t know it was alcohol because it had hearts in the box.
“If they were the kind of children to drink alcohol on their own, who knows what kind of trouble they would have got themselves into.”
When Ms Brannigan rang Asda to find out what had happened, she says she was told the person who had overseen the sale of alcohol to her children had been sacked.Thus putting the fear of god up all the others and ensuring that your elderly grandfather will be hassled for ID the next time he fancies a bottle of wine.
Well done, Ms Brannigan…
A spokeswoman for Asda issued an apology and admitted the supermarket got it wrong.So, expect long queues in Asda in future, while the staff check everything in fear of being sacked, all because someone let two children buy their mum a birthday present and a harassed checkout operator pushed a button they shouldn’t have…
She said: "We have a strict Challenge 25 policy on alcohol which we enforce across all our stores but on this occasion we didn't get it right and we're very sorry.
"In the small number of instances where we get it wrong, as we did in this instance, we take every opportunity to rebrief colleagues on the importance of ensuring we don't sell alcohol - including gift sets - to anyone under-age."
16 comments:
she was told the person who had overseen the sale of alcohol to her children had been sacked
I think this is the most depressing thing I have read this week.
Ahhhhhh.....Swanley! Go there on market day, a very shallow gene pool indeed.
I'm with Mr Eugenides on this. Surely they should have sacked the till for not telling the Asda wage slave to check for proof of age. That's what's normally blamed when someone get's asked for proof of age when Stevie Wonder can tell they're old enough, so when the over zealous tills uncharacteristically fail to prompt for an age check it must be their fault too, yes?
I don't believe that they sacked someone over that unless they'd had a member of staff on a serious disciplinary. They probably told her that to get the complaining bitch to fuck off.
More likely, because it was sold as a gift, someone hadn't marked it as "alcohol" to provide a warning to the member of staff, and it accidentally went through.
Of course, supermarkets are basically evil in the eyes of the press. Never mind that the real problem with kids getting hold of alcohol is small shops on estate that quite wilfully sell alcohol to kids.
I hate this country even more now.
They should have sacked the person at head office who inputted the bar code into their system without putting a 'flag' against it.
Sounds good to me. I could sent my lad to the offy and save myself the hassle.
PS Skye and Phoenix? Says all I need to know.
A picture of her in the newspapers looking angry and disgusted eh? One for this site methinks.
http://apiln.blogspot.com/
Enjoy.
A prime example of the sort of person who is ruining this country.
Busybodies to be exact.
One hopes that Skye and Phoenix have learnt their lesson and will never again give their mother a present of any kind, surprise or otherwise.
“How many other children may have managed to do this? I'm disgusted."
There is a certain charm in picturing Swanley's unruly teenagers regularly getting off their faces on miniature bottles of champagne.
i've a job interview with Asda next week - won't be going.Won't be shopping there ever again either.
Donna Brannigan’s daughter Skye and son Phoenix
Oh fer FUCKS SAKE!
This IMMEDIATELY shows what kind of a total fucking arsehole the mother is anyway.
Bet she wears "Fair trade crochet nickers" as well.
Blöoody WHIP the bastards.
Your quotes from the article missed this one, which I think may have something to do with Ms Brannigan's publicly expressed disgust:
“I would have at least expected a written apology. Asda is not exactly a small company.”
Don't you love that 'at least'? Hell hath no fury like a woman denied material compensation.
I would laugh if Asda's 'blood money' was another mini bottle of champagne and heart shape chocs.
You are right when you say that the remaining till operators will be operating in a climate of fear. I remember last time we blogged about till operator being over zealous I suggested that they operate under the threat of severe sanctions if they sell knives, alcohol, glue, aspirin, or lads mags to anyone who does not have grey hair and a zimmer frame. I feel sorry for the till operator. It may not have been obvious it was alcohol. The word 'scapegoat' springs to mind.
"I think this is the most depressing thing I have read this week."
I don't know, there's been a lot of pretty stiff competition...
"Ahhhhhh.....Swanley! Go there on market day, a very shallow gene pool indeed."
As others have pointed out, the names of the kids are pretty glaring beacons, aren't they?
"I don't believe that they sacked someone over that unless they'd had a member of staff on a serious disciplinary."
I'd like to think so too!
"I hate this country even more now."
It's alway the thing at the back of my mind when people say 'Oh, but it'sd the rules that are the problem, change them, and it'll all be sunshine and kittens!'.
They forget there are a lot of Donna Brannigans in the world...
"One for this site methinks."
Oh, just splendid!
"One hopes that Skye and Phoenix have learnt their lesson and will never again give their mother a present of any kind, surprise or otherwise."
It'd serve her right, wouldn't it?
"There is a certain charm in picturing Swanley's unruly teenagers regularly getting off their faces on miniature bottles of champagne."
I bet it wasn't even a particularly good vintage..
"Don't you love that 'at least'? Hell hath no fury like a woman denied material compensation."
Ah! Well spotted.
"I would laugh if Asda's 'blood money' was another mini bottle of champagne and heart shape chocs."
It's what I'd do! Probably why I'll never work in retail...
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